UCD / School of History

History has a bad brand; or rather it has a confused one. Mention the word history and immediately your imagination is cast into a world of muddy battle fields, black and white footage, ancient monuments and dusty scrolls. What you’re less inclined to think of is a subject and a discipline that requires intense skills of analysis, evaluation and contextual understanding.

I was approached by UCD’s School of History to help them communicate a more contemporary version of History. The department wanted to attract potential students to a Masters programme by drawing attention to the famous sons and daughters of UCD’s School of History. I was commissioned to design a suite of posters and a small booklet.

A lot of the concept for this work hinged on a simple tag line ‘History can take you anywhere’. The budget for this work was small so instead of chasing down portrait images of the individuals I chose to use imagery that either conveyed a glamorous destination or an iconic object such as a pen or statue of justice. Has this work helped shape somebody’s destiny? Here’s hoping.